Hawaii Pt 1 ended after I was hired at Perry's Smorgy and I regaled how the main managers, Jim and Dave ( I remembered his name finally) were total dicks. In fact after the episode with Dave and the lovely Samoan coffee server I remember asking Eric if he had ever met Dave and Eric made a spurting motion with his hands as if out of the top of his head. That told me all I needed to know. Rob managed to escape Perry's first. He saw an add in the paper for The Photo Stores. They were always advertising for counter/sales help. Rob went in to Outrigger Photo for an interview with Maria and she hired him on the spot with the question "Well, do you want to give it a shot?" Maria was the wife of Steve who was sort of the general manager of all the stores. Apparently his brother was the owner. Rob's first impression of Steve was positive; in fact, he said he reminded him of Eric's dad. So immediately after Rob was hired, I went in to apply and was asked the same, "Want to give it a shot question?" Man, I was sooo happy to be free of Perry's! Even though this job paid less per hour, we were full time (Perry's was part time, just like Wal Mart, trying to avoid having to pay for benefits) and no more 6:00 AM start time. 3:00 PM baby! This allowed for drinking and sleeping in. We were also eligible for "spiffs" (what a stupid term) based on how much film processing we sold as well as "guiding" people to the more profitable camera brands...Ricoh and Vivitar, primarily.
The bloom fell off the rose rather quickly...especially for Rob. First of all, Steve (manager) knew we were friends but somehow he thought Rob was some other Rob who had a bit of a shady past, so he made sure to put me in a separate store: Tower Photo on Lewer's St. Later on he realized he had made a mistake. Second, Rob was relegated to the back room at Outrigger Photo with all the telescopes and binoculars, i.e. no chance for spiffs. He was actually forbidden to cross the line into the main store, which led to some guy ripping the store off and Rob couldn't stop him since he couldn't cross said line...pretty funny actually.
That said, I actually kind of felt sorry for Maria, she was cute in a world weary soccer-mom kind of way and I think she ended up in a life that she would not have wished for herself. Hell, she had to wear the same lame smocks that the rest of us did. If she seemed bitter I couldn't completely blame her, even when it was taken out on us. And to be honest, I wasn't on the end of it in the way Rob was. He had to work at the same store as she. I worked with a couple local guys, Matt and Layne. They were both cool. Layne was a good-natured gay chap and Matt was a cool techno kind of guy. He believed in IBM over Apple and Nikon over Canon...I had neither a computer nor a camera at the time so I had no opinion there. He got called out by the boss for reading The Wishsong of Shannara while on the clock. We all got on well. Peter was another guy that worked my shift for a while until he was fired for stealing. Apparently he was shoveling like 1/3 of all cash he took in into his pocket. He got caught by the hoards of Merit shoppers they were apparently sending in during his shift.
Right after I was hired at Perry's I also got a gig teaching guitar at Floyd's of Hawaii on Kapahulu. The dude that interviewed me, Carl, wanted me to have another job before he ok'd me to teach. As I had only recently arrived he wanted to make sure I stayed around for a while, fair enough. I also ended up teaching at their Kailua store and soon had enough students that I was able to quit the Photo Stores.
Also around this time we decided to find another place to live. Three guys in a small-than-studio size hotel room was just to many. Especially since I had to sleep on the floor...well, I was the last one to arrive. We found a pretty nice two-bedroom apartment a few blocks away. It was owned by a middle aged Japanese gentleman called Ray K. He was really cool. When he came to collect the rent he would always bring a box of fruit and vegetables, and sometimes beer. He probably thought that 3 kids in their early twenties weren't always eating properly..not many vitamins in Top Ramen. Actually we did ok, finances forced Rob and I into a lot of rice and zucchini! Eric usually ate at work, the Shorebird; they had a good salad bar and hamburger stand.
So that was how things stabilized for a while: Rob and I at the Photo Stores w/ me supplementing my income by teaching and Eric as kitchen manager at the Shorebird. We hung out with Tony a guy from Bermuda who worked the front desk at the Prince (our previous abode, the one with the hookers).
